


Gralusha Pennypacker 

Brigadier General and Brevet Major 
General, United States Volunteers 

Brigadier General and Brevet Major 
General, United States Army 

America's Youngest General 



19 17 

Christophbr Sower Company 

Philadklphia 



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BKETVET "MAJ OP. GEtsTETlAX G . PE N^^l'PA C KE R . U, S . A 



Galusha Pennypacker 



Brigadier General and Brevet Major General 
United States Volunteers 

Brigadier General and Brevet Major General 
United States Army 



America's Youngest General 






" Dangers on dangers all around him grouu." — Iliad. 



1917 

Christopher Sower Company 

Philadelphia 



GALUSHA PENNYPACKER 



MANY thousands of men fought to preserve the 
Union and are unknown beyond the country 
church-yards where their names are graven. 
Many splendid deeds were done which will cause sailors 
like the great-hearted Craven, the fearless Bailey, the dar- 
ing Gushing to be un forgotten. Many soldier names live 
in the nation's records because of deep-lying, dependable 
courage and manly character, such as marked the careers 
of Bayard and Hartranft. Many thousands of soldiers 
suffered by reason of wounds, injuries, sickness. There 
were men in the loyal host whose names blazed up over- 
night, as if written in the sky in letters of flame for all 
the North to read, to pay tribute to and remember. 

Among all these there was none that fought more 
bravely, there was none that did more daring deeds, there 
was none that was cooler in the rush and the fury of 
battle, there was none that suffered more severely or more 
constantly or longer than Galusha Pennypacker. There 
was none whose name oftener was flashed over the coimtry 
because of some act of heroism that called forth song and 
toast and cheers. His career was the career of a hero of 
romance, run swiftly in a land whose later novelists and 
poets can discern no romance. In the Balkans, in the 
Scotland of Sir Walter Scott, in the Poland of Sienkie- 
wicz, his romantic story would have become a part of the 
country's folklore, imparted at the fireside, learned in the 
cradle. 

If his was a career of glory, it was also a career of 
infinite pathos. From infancy to death his life was one 
of loneliness. The only child of a mother who died when 



Galusha Pennypackee 



he was an infant, his father a Mexican War soldier and 
Cahfomia adventurer, from the period at which memory 
begins he never knew his parents, and never had brother, 
sister or wife. When the army mail came into camp, and 
around their fires soldiers read their letters from home, there 
was no home letter for him. The ranking officer after the 
war at different anny posts — Nashville, Grenada, Jack- 
son, Covington, Fort Riley, his was the isolation of a com- 
manding officer. Wounded seven times within eight 
months, the memory of his five promotions within a single 
year could not assuage the pain endured daily for fifty- 
one years. Secretary of War Dickinson expressed his 
amazement at discovering that there were prominent Phila- 
delphians unaware that for thirty-three years after his 
retirement from the United States Army he had lived in 
their own city, and he died October 1, 1916, in the lonely 
hours of the night, with no relative or friend at his 
hospital bedside. 

Let no man go to war with the thought that he will 
win unspoiled glory. If disease do not prostrate him, if 
shot or shell do not maim him, if the fault of another do 
not dim his laurel — even if he rise to high command and 
save his country, the fate of Belisarius may still be his, 
and his reward be ingratitude, oblivion and the consoling 
sense of duty done. 

At eighteen years of age declining, because of his 
youth, the lieutenancy of his company in the three months' 
service; captain of the first company of a three years' 
regiment; commanding Camp Wayne, West Chester, and 
mustering into the service the companies of the regiment; 
major in October, 1861, at Fortress Monroe, Port Royal, 
North Edisto, and in June, 1862, at James Island; in the 
winter of 1862-63 member of a board to retire incompetent 
officers ; thanked by his brigade commander for prompt- 



America's Youngest Geneeal 



ness and efficiency in the action at Seabrook Point, June 
18, 1863 ; rising from a sickbed to lead his regiment in the 
final assault on Forts Wagner and Gregg; in charge of 
an officers' school of instruction at Fernandina, Fla., and 
president of a general court-martial at the age of twenty- 
one; leading two surprise expeditions inland into Florida 
and Georgia, and capturing the Confederate Camp Cooper, 
and then commander of the post at Fernandina, his service 
showed how he had justified General Terry's prediction 
that he would make his mark. 

In twenty-four hours after the arrival of relieving 
troops at Fernandina, he collected his command, scattered 
over a circuit of from ten to fourteen miles, had all the 
accounts with proper vouchers of post quartermaster, post 
commissary, ordnance officer and provost marshal, and 
125 prisoners, transferred, marched his troops to the 
landing and embarked to join the Army of the James. 
When under twenty-two, promoted to lieutenant colonel, 
and still commanding the regiment as for a long time 
previously, and leading the advance on the Richmond and 
Petersburg Railroad; in the action at Swift Creek, May 
8, and at Fort Darling and Drury's Bluff; checking 
Beauregard's advance troops for half a day on the Wier 
Bottom Church road; leading a charge at Foster's place, 
May 18, 1864, and another charge at Green Plains, where 
he lost two-thirds of his men and was three times wounded 
— so his record runs. 

When twenty-two years old, on June 23, 1864, he was 
commissioned as colonel of his regiment, and twice more 
was he to be the first man to mount a Confederate work 
and implant the first Union Colors upon it. On August 
14, 1864, in command of two regiments, he gave support 
to the Second Corps of Meade's Army. On the 15th he 
led his regiment in action, and on the 16th at Strawberry 



Galusha Pennypacker 



Plains, drove the enemy from its intrenchments, placing a 
flag within a few feet of a Virginia flag. 

He had just turned his twenty-second year when placed 
in command of the largest brigade of the Tenth Corps. 
He led it at Chaffin's Blufi", and at Fort Harrison he 
drove the enemy from its line and captured heavy guns 
and many prisoners. At Fort Gilmer he led his brigade 
through a mile of slashing and over a stream, and was 
again wounded and his horse was shot. At Darbytown 
road, October 29, he again led his command in action. 
His corps commander commended him for zealous and un- 
tiring efforts to make his brigade efficient, for the manner 
in which he led it in action, and recommended him for 
promotion, and his army commander conveyed the recom- 
mendation to President Lincoln. 

At the assault and capture of Fort Fisher, a Confed- 
erate work stronger than Malakoff, on January 15, 1865, 
for the third time he placed the colors of his old regiment 
squarely upon the fort, the first Union colors to be there, 
and was again so seriously wounded that a coffin was 
ordered for him. His division commander. General Ames, 
declared him to be the "hero of Fort Fisher." Secretary 
of War Stanton wrote to President Lincoln citing his serv- 
ice, and in the name of the President tendered the thanks 
of the nation to the officers and men whose valor and skill 
had carried the fort. Salutes were ordered fired at every 
navy yard and by each of the armies in front of Lee. 

On Secretary Stanton's recommendation given the 
brevet rank of brigadier general to date from the capture 
of Fort Fisher, January 15, he was appointed to the full 
rank of brigadier general of volunteers, February 18, 1865, 
and was the youngest officer in all the northern and 
southern armies to attain that rank — as later in 1866, at 
the age of twenty-four, when President Johnson appointed 



America's Youngest General 



him a colonel in the regular army, he was the youngest 
officer who had ever held that rank from the time of the 
establishment of the United States army. 

In 1872, when he was thirty years old, many of the 
leading Republican newspapers of Pennsylvania urged his 
nomination for the office of Governor, an honor which he 
declined to consider. On account of his wounds he was 
placed on the retired list in 1883. But for his injuries, he 
would have risen to the command of the United States 
Army, as did General Miles, who, several years his senior 
in age, became a colonel on the same day in 1866 that 
General Pennypacker attained that rank. 

Surely Melpomene presided at his birth. When, after 
the capture of Fort Fisher, he was borne to a vessel lying 
off the fort and laid upon a table in the saloon, he was 
hurled to the floor by the pitching of the boat. During 
dress parade at a Mississippi army post the huge flag 
pole collapsed and fell within a few feet of where he stood. 
In 1877 he came from Fort Riley to attend a family 
gathering at Washington's Camp ground at Pennypacker's 
Mills, on the Perkiomen. Floods washed away the rail- 
road beds in the vicinity on the day of the meeting, and 
many of his relatives were killed. Not many years ago 
he was confined to his bed in his Philadelphia home, suf- 
fering more than his ordinary measure of torture from his 
wounds. His physician, the only other person in the room, 
stood at his bedside bending over him. Suddenly the 
doctor threw his arms about his patient's neck. The 
soldier looked up; the physician was dead. In 1872 he 
was present at a great review of troops in Germany. His 
horse became frightened and ran down the line of soldiers. 
The saddle-girth broke, throwing the rider to the side of 
the horse. Crippled by his wounds, he threw his arms 
around the neck of the animal and held fast until, after a 



8 Galusha Pennypacker 

ride as wild as Mazeppa's, the horse was caught. Mount- 
ing again, he rode back. The Emperor of Austria brought 
him a glass of wine. The old German Emperor Frederick, 
the Crown Prince, afterward Emperor, and Bismarck 
came to him and praised his pluck. The Empress invited 
him to dinner. Count von Moltke received him with com- 
pliments, saying that he no doubt was the oldest general 
in the world and that he was glad to meet the youngest 
general. The Count asked him where he had been wounded. 
The American modestly replied that he had been wounded 
several times. The Count asked: "Where did you receive 
your worst wound?" General Pennypacker answered 
briefly, "At Fort Fisher." "Oh," said the Count, "that 
was on the Cape Fear River in North Carolina." 

His uniform, including the hat which the German 
Crown Prince, afterward Frederick III, in a schoolboy 
spirit exchanged for that of the American officer, saying, 
"You wear my hat a while and I'll wear yours," together 
with swords, horse fittings and other relics of army service, 
will be preser\'ed by the West Chester Historical Society. 
General Meade, thoughtful and attentive, voluntarily 
sent him letters to prominent officers in Europe. The 
names of both had been placed on the board of some 
soldier-exploitation scheme originating with cruder minds, 
and in a protecting way the victor at Gettysburg, who 
thought the scheme an unworthy one, said: "Don't have 
anything to do with it; I shan't." Meade's son, Colonel 
Meade, then president of the Philadelphia Club, socially 
the leading men's club in the city, not long after General 
Pennypacker had settled in Philadelphia, said that a num- 
ber of the more influential members of the club as well as he 
himself would like to elect him to membership in the club, 
but were doubtful as to his attitude toward the project. 
Advice was sought and the suggestion was dropped. 
And at the end this gallant soldier, who shrank from per- 



America's Youngest General 9 

sonal notoriety, was buried in the National Cemetery, 
Philadelpliia, with the simple services of the Society of 
Friends. 

Secretary of War Dickinson has somewhat overdrawn 
the indifference of the people of Philadelphia toward him. 
Long ago the Pennsylvania Society of the Cincinnati 
elected him an honorary member. The Union League, 
somewhat late, it is true, considering its origin, made him 
an honorary member. A State military office was offered 
him and declined. The Pennsylvania Commandery of the 
Loyal Legion would have made him its commander but for 
his own unwillingness. To his home at 300 South Tenth 
Street came daily men from the city, the State and distant 
States, occasionally a Secretary of War, a general com- 
manding the United States Army, soldiers who had fought 
the good fight with him or Quaker pacifists whose hearts 
were won by his courtesy and gentlemanliness. 

Not the least of his rare qualities were his good man- 
ners. He was as punctilious about doing the right thing 
as he was about the punctuation of a letter, wherein no 
expert proofreader was his superior. The widow of Presi- 
dent Polk said he was the only commanding officer ever 
stationed at Nashville who knew how to present to her 
properly on New Year's Day the subordinate officers of 
the post. Keen perceptive faculty, accuracy, system, 
order, a tenacious memory, humor — all these were his, as 
well as a will like adamant and a shrewdness whose other 
name is wisdom. But it was the impression made by the 
courtesy of the high-bred gentleman that men brought in 
contact with him oftenest carried away. From the 
humble orderly to men of the highest station it was 
the same. It was the same a few hours before his end, 
when, fast bleeding to death from that half-century- 
old wound whose fatal flow no art could check, his nerves 



10 Galusha Pennypackee 

literally bullet-jangled, and but lately recovered from 
another illness that would have ended many another career, 
he put aside weakness, pain and the fast inclosing shades 
of death to give a last smile and last courteous words to 
one who would have helped if help there could have been. 

The young officer of thirty-five had commanded the 
Department of the South, embracing many of the Southern 
States, in a stormy period of the nation's life. His active 
work was finished at the age of forty-one. His heroism is 
recorded in Grant's "Memoirs." He had thirty-three years 
more of life that were years of endurance. With so rich 
an equipment of mind, character and personality — he was 
one of the handsomest officers in the army — far as he went, 
how much further he might have gone save for his grievous 
wounds ! 

Intended sophistry and unintended confusion of 
thought, to which men like Charles Francis Adams yielded, 
have combined to teach American youth that it is imma- 
terial on which side of an issue involving the life of the 
Union American manhood takes stand. The death of the 
unimportant Confederate Mosby receives more attention 
from the press than the death of the far more important 
Union General Gregg. Does such perversion of thought 
indicate a national canker that needs to be watched? 
Everywhere patriotic societies of women condemned the 
attack made by Secretary of War Baker upon the soldiers 
of Valley Forge. The Daughters of the Confederacy were 
silent. 

Secretary of War Dickinson wrote from Chicago to 
the Public Ledger that if the Southern Confederacy had 
possessed a soldier of the high character and splendid 
achievements of General Pennypacker, not onlj^ his home 
city, but the whole South would have known where he lived. 
A writer in the New York Sun said that Philadelphia has 



America's Youngest General 11 

another Mecca in his grave. A walk of a Httle more than 
an hour will cover the distance between the birthplace of 
General Wayne at Waynesborough and that of General 
Pennypacker at Valley Forge. As inseparable as the 
storming of Stony Point and the name of Anthony Wayne 
are the storming of Fort Fisher and the name of Galusha 
Pennypacker. 



